Ch 18.1 Assessment Questions (pg 515)
1a. Identify two goals of systematic.
To assign each species a unique, universally accepted name; to organize living things into
groups that have biological meaning
1b. Why do the common names of organisms – like daisy or mountain lion – often cause
problems for scientist? (Why does it cause a problem? Why is it a problem?)
Common names vary among languages and from place to place
1c. The scientific name of the sugar maple is Acer saccharum. What does each part of the name
designate?
Acer designates the genus name, and saccharum designates the species.
2a. List the ranks in the Linnaean system of classification, beginning with the smallest
Species, genus, family, order, class, phylum, kingdom
2b. In which group of organisms are the members more closely associated – all of the
organisms in the same kingdom or all of the organisms in the same order? Explain your answers
Organisms in the same order because order is a smaller rank and covers fewer species
than a kingdom does.
2c. What do scientists mean when they say that species is the only “natural” rank in
classification?
Species is the only rank not defined by scientists. A species is defined by a natural
process – mating to produce fertile offspring.
3. Which category has more biological meaning – all brown birds or all birds descended from a
hawk-like ancestor? Why?
“All birds descended form a hawk-like ancestor” has more biological meaning because
not all brown birds are closely related based on evolutionary relationships.
Ch 18.3 Assessment Questions (pg 528)
1a. What are the six kingdoms of life as they are now identified?
Eubacteria, Archaebacteria, “Protista,” Fungi, Plantae, Animalia.
1b. Why did systematists establish the domain?
Because genomic analysis revealed that the two main prokaryotic groups (eubacteria and
archaebacteria) are more different from each other, and from eukaryotes, than previously
thought.
1c. What were the monerans? Why did systematists split them into two kingdoms?
In the five-kingdom system, the Monera included all prokaryotes. Prokaryotes were split
into two kingdoms because organisms in Monera are actually two genetically and
biochemically different groups
2a. What are the three domains of life?
Bacteria, Archaea, Eukarya
2b. Why are quotes used when describing the kingdom “protista”?
Quotes are used to acknowledge that the kingdom Protista is paraphyletic, and therefore
invalid under evolutionary classification. (From 5 different clades)
2c. Do you think the tree of life cladogram will always stay the same as it is in Figure 18-18?
Explain your answers.
Probably not. Through further research, biologist will likely discover new relationships
among organisms that will lead to different classifications.
3a. Which domain have unbranched lipids in their cell membranes?
All in domain Bacteria and Eukarya; some in Archaea
3b. Which domain has just one type of RNA polymerase?
Bacteria
On the basis of this table, how are Archaea different from bacteria?
Introns are sometimes present in Archaea but rarely in Bacteria. Bacteria have only one
type of RNA polymerase, while there are several types in Archaea. Histones are present
in Archaea but not in Bacteria. There are only unbranched lipids in Bacteria; some lipids
are branched in Archaea.